in Natural History, a very elegant gem, whose colour is deep red, with an admixture of scarlet.

This gem was known among the ancients by the name of anthrax. It is usually found pure and faultless, and is of the same degree of hardness with the sapphire: it is naturally of an angular figure; and is found adhering by its base, to a heavy and ferruginous stone of the emery kind: its usual size is near a quarter of an inch in length, and two-thirds of that in diameter in its thickest parts: when held up against the sun, it loses its deep tinge, and becomes exactly of the colour of a burning charcoal, whence the propriety of the name which the ancients gave it. It bears the fire unaltered, not parting with its colour, nor becoming at all the paler by it. It is found only in the East Indies, so far as is yet known; and there but very rarely.

or Anthrax, in Medicine, an inflammation which arises, in time of the plague, with a vesicle or blister almost like that produced by burning.

in Heraldry, a charge or bearing, consisting of eight radii, four whereof make a common cross, and the other four a saltier.

Some call these radii buttons, or flames, because round, and enriched with buttons, or pearly like pilgrims' flames, and frequently tipped or terminated with flower-de-luces.